Part-time lawyers are mostly women

Not surprising, a majority of lawyers working on a part-time basis are women.

A new study released by the National Association of Legal Career Professionals (also known as NALP) analyzed information from more than 1,100 law firms and found that 6.2 percent of lawyers work part-time—the same percentage as 2011. Of those part-time lawyers, a whopping 70 percent were women.

The number of women lawyers working part-time doesn’t even come close to that of other industries. Of the 5.3 percent of architects and engineers that work part-time, for example, only 29 percent of them are women, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

According to NALP’s executive director, James Leipold, almost all law firms offer a flexible work schedule, including a part-time option, but the culture of law firms discourages lawyers from participating in those programs. "Firms need to have both women and men at a high level position who are themselves using a part-time schedule so it's modeled as okay," he said.

According to the study, 13.5 percent of all woman law firm lawyers work part-time, versus 2.7 percent of lawyers who are men. Of the women lawyers working part-time, about 10 percent are associates and 11.7 percent are partners.